Analyst Report - Additional Reasons

4. Additional Reasons Coursera Is a Good Investment

Management Team:
Both founders of the company (Koller and Ng) have significant backgrounds in academia and have won multiple awards and were named one of TIME Magazine’s 100 most influential people in 2012 and 2013 respectively. Coursera has an impressive leadership team. They are high-achieving and award-winning experts who have held distinguishable positions in their careers. Their track record of management is successful and strong. In 2017, Coursera hired Jeff Maggioncalda who has ‘’put the company on a growth trajectory that includes expansion around the world.’’ (Forbes, 2019).

Values:

Coursera has a vision that ‘’the best learning is a right, not a privilege.’’ Their mission is to provide world-class learning to anyone, anywhere so they can ‘’transform their life through learning.’’ Coursera Impact Report 2021 states that ‘’ Coursera works with a variety of non-profit organizations to offer free learning resources to several communities in need, including refugees, veterans, justice-impacted individuals, and underserved high-schoolers.’’
Coursera also offers financial aid and scholarships for eligible learners who cannot afford to pay for certificates.

Image Source: Coursera Impact Report 2021

Future of MOOCs industry: Extensive literature reviews (Sir, 2015) suggest that learning practitioners have mixed views on the future of MOOCs. While some welcome them with enthusiasm, others are skeptic and claim that ‘’ the innovations of MOOCs are the victory of packaging over content’’ (Sir et al., 2015) and that the benefits of MOOCs are already realized in older forms of open and distance learning. Additionally, they state that MOOCs suffer from weaknesses in many areas including quality of learning, accreditation, support of challenged learners, and access. This is probably true, however, as an EVA, I believe this means that there is an enormous place for innovation. There’s still so much to be done in the industry of MOOCs; it’s a maturing business, not a dead end. The chance to improve and stand out is massive which means the chance to make substantial profits is stronger than ever. Moreover, the extensive literature review (Sir et al., 2015) reveals that the majority of learners reported a positive experience with MOOCs even those who did not complete courses. Online learning and training platforms are becoming a necessity and the demand is highly predicted to increase.

As an EVA, I concur that Coursera is a worthy investment. No matter from which angle one looks at it, Coursera has proven to be a lucrative and noble investment and is expected to remain so in the years ahead.

Page updated

Google Sites

Report abuse